Game development: Don’t try to learn too much

The funny thing about this post is that I’m telling you right away to not listen to anything I’m about to tell you. In fact you should not even listen to me telling you to not listen to what I’ll tell you. Repeat until your brain explodes.

I finally took some time to play the hugesmashinghitMinecraft (now free to play until problems with the server are fixed). I tried this game months ago but didn’t really spent too much time on it.

I guess that if Markus Persson would have been told what I have been told in the past that maybe he would have never released Minecraft. Or maybe he’s just even more bull-headed than me so he did anyway. So let’s start where this post should start: Congrats Markus for your success, your hard work and believing in what you did. Indies need inspiration and you surely became one if you were not one already.

So what I have been told that turned out to be total bullshit but that I didn’t know was total bullshit at the time? Well I’ll just scratch 2 things: crappy graphics and no tutorial for a complex game is a good recipe to kill an interesting game. Those are 2 small things but 2 small things I heard over and over than I finally almost believed everyone telling me so.

On one side we have people who played Golemizer for 2 minutes and then forgot about it or told me that graphics and “hard to understand” would just not cut it. On the other side we have passionate players that while smart don’t have any degree in rocket science that figured how the game worked and how fun it could be. For some reason I always took the side of those who told me I should do better instead of improving what was already good. Sorry to all players about that. I should have known better.

So who were those who told me Golemizer had crappy graphics and non-existing tutorial? The same who are currently praising and giving great review to Minecraft… I already congratulated Markus for his work so I’m not trying to diminish in any way what he did. I’m only pointing to these people that it’s way damn easier to praise the depth and fun of a game once it already became a huge success. Don’t worry though as I already figured a long time ago that reviewers are people making money based on their traffic and not on the quality of their work. Review an unknown game=no traffic. Review the current flavor of the month=a boost in revenue. No hard feelings. We all want to make money somehow.

The problem is that I really believed there was a problem with Golemizer’s graphics or that the lack of good tutorial (or the lack of whatever anyone with more experience than me would tell me) was a huge problem. Well after looking at Minecraft I can only conclude that I must unlearn much of the stuff I thought I “learned”. Minecraft graphics? About the same as Wolfenstein (I enjoyed a lot Wolfenstein but let’s agree those are not great graphics compared to what we usually see these days…). If Minecraft wasn’t a hit the first thing people would say is that the game isn’t popular because it has bad graphics and people like good graphics. Minecraft tutorial? What tutorial!?!?!?!

– Spoiler –

The first 5 worlds I created I ended dead because some freaky monsters killed me when it was night or because I somehow mined the water and ended up drowning because I didn’t know how to get out of there.

– End spoiler –

In fact I didn’t get anything about Minecraft until I watched this video (contains spoiler). Golemizer is much more forgiving than Minecraft but still most of the people who could have talked about it didn’t even tried to spend more time in it than they did in their first try in Minecraft. Asking them to watch a video or read some help text would have been terrible I’m sure… They have so many mails in their inbox about reviewing “good” games so they really can’t waste time on a game they don’t understand in the first 30 seconds… Instead they just told me that Golemizer really need a better tutorial or first time experience. Sorry but my initial experience in Minecraft wasn’t quite enjoyable (it did became interesting after seeing the spoilers in the video). So it’s ok for Minecraft to have a terrible first-hand experience and no tutorial but it’s not ok for Golemizer. Bah.

But let’s not blame them too much as like I said most of them talked about Minecraft once it already was a success. They’re in it for the business and not the games and I can understand that.

So let’s shift to other things I’ve been told. Advertisement. It seems you almost have to do this. Well Minecraft didn’t do any paid advertisement but everyone that “knows” how to sell a game will tell you that you have to do some kind of marketing. Maybe ads, maybe some Twitter spam, anything. Yet I look at Minecraft and don’t see any of this. Poor me I thought that’s what was needed and fell into the trap spending useless money in this. Again I listened to people who “knew” more than me.

By now you’re already telling yourself that Minecraft is just a better game than Golemizer. Just ask Markus if he knew his game would have such success when he was building it and I’m sure his answer will be “No”. Didn’t mean he didn’t believe in what he was doing. Didn’t mean he didn’t thought it was clever. Didn’t mean he didn’t thought it could have some success. It just mean there was no way of knowing.

There was no way of knowing. Still a lot of people believe they know what is required to build some success. Note that I used the word “build” here. Looking at Minecraft I can only (once again) come to the conclusion that a lot of people talk but very few “do”. Too bad I listened to the talking people at first. Maybe I should have kept doing whatever without knowing anything. Maybe it wouldn’t have changed anything. Maybe it would have been worse. The only thing I know is that there is no way to tell for sure. Simple like that.

So what I’m trying to say here is that if you’d like to work on a game do it the way you want to do it. Don’t get your hopes too high, just keep to what you feel is right. It might not provide the results you were expecting but if it doesn’t live up to expectations and you kept to your bull-headed mind then it will be less frustrating than listening to anyone “knowing” what you should do and convincing you that you were wrong all that time before “knowing”.

Oh I guess that it’s quite possible your work never bring any results but at least you’ll have the satisfaction of not being fooled by some people who thought knew better than you. There’s no way to predict what will work and what won’t. If there was then everybody would be following this recipe and every single indie game developer would have thousands of dollars held by Paypal.

So don’t try to learn too much from others. Learn from yourself. Be deaf a bit but don’t be blind either. In fact you shouldn’t even try to learn that from my blog… Go figure. Just do as you want. That’s the best I know. Just do something and build on top of that.

Funny how I’ve got too, the 2 ‘complains’: no tutorials and where are the animations? And because of that the people abandoned the game earlier bla bla. In the end it doesn’t matter, only luck and some (actually lots of) money and/or fame will make your game a success.
However I say it is the best to learn from the others especially people who did stuff successfully or not. The important thing is to know that everybody’s case is different and understand there is no silver bullet, no recipe for success. It’s either luck and/or experience.
(Quote)

I played mine craft ehhh i got the idea but……well see heres the thing mine craft was big because it became a reference points on blogs and reviews as strange and to me point less as mine craft was it was unique and that did help its fame. Also…..just a not of common sense….if they review games or they critics of any kind…..dont listen to them that was sorta a given for me…..also i live like an hour away from the worlds leading gaming company’s

(EA games westwood{whats left} epic games and a few others)

but i think you could drop the whole indie gamer thing and just go pro XD, now i know ur in France errr Canada or something so i don’t know if there’s lots of french gaming company’s. BUT i think u could be a lead game designer easily. now i also live like an hour away from the biggest gaming school in…..anywhere i know of….so theres that too. If you went pro you will have to take a few classes and brush up on some stuff probably, As a lead designer you could direct the whole team it would be like working by your self but…..having every one else do the work XD

now im not saying you should/can fly to America get a dream job making games and live happily ever after but what i am saying is.

To be honest going “pro” is not much of an interest right now. My interest lies in building my own stuff or work in very small teams. I never was interested to join big corporations as one of my interest is to be part of the many levels of game development.

I’m of course not expecting to become rich that way or to hit success like Minecraft (as I’m writing this he sold 10,000 more copies in the last 24 hours…) just to make a living. For me deciding what I work on and making my own schedule is worth a lot of money and indie provides me this even if for now it’s not a financially viable.
(Quote)

ok i see what i said ok one second let me re-put.
Indie game devs dont make any money, the maker of mine craft was indie till his game sold, the point of indie is independent but when you sell games least enough to make a living then uv gone pro weather u know it or not. What im saying is if you drop the term “indie” get a small team make it look like u know what ur doing and make a game(a good one) sell that like a pro and then once that’s done you will; A: have a name and
B: have cash to spend on what ever your next project is. and you can take that and apply it to what ever game you want to do next in your free time. See the thing is i REALLY dont want you to end up a indie game dev cause i cant stand them and its not independent game makers that i cant stand, its the fact that they get the same mentality like abstract artists that make silly art and complain that no one likes it (not that thats u..) That is what indie gaming has become people make games and then make BLOGS and COMPLAIN that no one buys their games and that some other guys did(this is indie gaming in general) and i dont know what they want us to do walk over to happy land where every one a millions of dollars to spend on games and every one likes what you make but IM SICK OF IT(i read like over 20 indie game dev blogs) STOP COMPLAINING ITS UR FAULT ur kinfolk(indie game devs) Have no ambition they enjoy the starving artist mentality, I would go as far as to say some keep from making good games to keep that mentality. and i think if indie game devs want to be more than people living with their mom making games in the basement(not u im talking to indie game devs in general so making sure every one is included) if they want respect then i would really like it if every one toughened up a bit, i know its hard WELL GET OVER IT your making video games for heavens sake, and thats not easy but you don’t have to! You do it cause you enjoy it or you “want” to make a living off it , and if you are WELL GOOD FOR YOU cause out of the millions of indie game devs just look foot ball in America only 1 out of a million make it big time or make it at all. AND they don’t complain!……..im done now…
(Quote)

Well that’s the point of this post exactly. How do you know that a specific project will be good and sell well? If there was a way to be sure then every single game developer would be successful. Even “pros” as you call them don’t know that (see recent closure of APB as a good example).

It’s much more easier to say that X game is good or bad then actually building a good game… So that’s why to you that we seem to complain all the time. For a gamer it’s always obvious to tell if that game is good or bad. And by the way I don’t know of many game developers that are deliberately working on games they think are “bad”…
(Quote)

Over00: “make a game(a good one)”Well that’s the point of this post exactly. How do you know that a specific project will be good and sell well? If there was a way to be sure then every single game developer would be successful. Even “pros” as you call them don’t know that (see recent closure of APB as a good example).It’s much more easier to say that X game is good or bad then actually building a good game… So that’s why to you that we seem to complain all the time. For a gamer it’s always obvious to tell if that game is good or bad. And by the way I don’t know of many game developers that are deliberately working on games they think are “bad”…

ok today im doing good ^_^ yesterday i was at school for hours and hours so i was a bit fustrated XD anyway moving on

what i meant there was when i said make a game that i meant make a good gave vs a bad game and expect the same out come, and i have done enough game development to know what your saying. Now “pros” is meant here to say sell it like a large company like EA(tho please stay away form EA i hate them with a vengeance) ALL indie gamers would benefit from a small business course(you can take them on weekends and nights if u work). and i didn’t mean that they were making so much as “bad” games but more so of “not” making them, And i can say that cause iv seen it people get great idea they get support and then they instead make some 2d flash game that gets 10k hits and never makes it anywhere.

Now that im not anger i can address the complaint issue, when you go from blog to blog and all you read is “oh this guy did X thing to make y game big and made z cash” it gets to be irritating and pointless. I wouldn’t hurt to hear some positive things form the indie game dev community? how about little things if not big i don’t care if its just”oh hey had a break through on the script today” or “I got this great idea for X project” and my points are directed at EVERYONE in the indie game dev world not really so much as you, your my fav game dev and if ANYTHING gets my approval it/they must be absolutely awesome.
(Quote)

Shit, Sauerbraten/Cube engine was out way before Minecraft (AND IS SO MUCH BETTER). And everyone mentions Dwarf Fortress. Notch is lucky.

I feel the most of the games that make money are just lucky. It takes quite a bit of luck to go ‘viral’. If your game doesn’t go viral, you’ll barely make beer money.

There’s no way to predict if a game is going to be viral either. You can follow some basic principals about keeping it simple and possibly using a bit of marketing, but in the end, it’s all about luck.
(Quote)

Marus had lots of adverstisement. He was the original Client developer for wurmonline, he then preceded to give client development to a community team to work on RL stuff. A good time later he comes by and shows the earliest alpha’s of minecraft to “old friends” in the wurmonline community. then early betas. You see wurmonline is also a crafting and world building game so it was like selling to people already addicted. Another thing to consider is that the FacePunch and Something awful community had a pretty major precense in wurmonline allowing minecraft to go viral pretty easily, since the community leaders he previously showed were also such in those other communities it was insanely easy for it to go viral(probably not just easy but inevitable).
(Quote)

I’m constantly baffled by how many indie devs posting games on Greenlight are not doing anything to build their audience outside of Steam. It’s not like there’s a lack of “you should do this or that” posts addressed to indies out there. Yet, many of them help propagating the “I just need to get on […]

So once again we are blessed with advice from the Internet in this article titled “How Not To Get Your Game Reviewed“. I’m not saying there’s not something good to get out of this but as always be careful when reading these “advice”. #10 – I see plenty of Kickstarter getting covered and often what […]

A tough thing to ask indies is that they see their journey in game development as a marathon when what we keep seeing day after day are sprinters occupying 90% of the press space. It can be difficult but that’s the only way to be able to continue working when things don’t quite go the […]

Twitter : Not great Twitter doesn’t quite work. At least, it’s far from any expectations I had. I already talked about it but I think it’s worth repeating as I’m not the only one that came to that conclusion. Interesting fact: writing a tweet that gets retweeted ten thousand times does NOT translate into more […]

If things didn’t go your way you are most likely to be even more clueless about why it went wrong once you read the comments … Kyle Pittman wrote a post-mortem about Super Win the Game here. Reading the comments is quite depressing. Depressing because instead of thanking the dev, people are spending their time […]

I’ve had so many ideas “stolen” in the past few years that I have given up on the concept of “ideas” itself. I now believe in timing, experience, patterns and the very old concept of “get up in the morning and do something”. I may or may not plan to build upon these ideas but […]

You can now pre-order Human Extinction Simulator and play the new beta version (available if you pre-order the game only). Check the game’s website to pre-order now: http://www.machine22.com/humanextinctionsimulator/ Steam and Greenlight You’ll notice that pre-ordering the game will provide you 1 or 2 Steam keys so make sure to vote to get HES accepted on Steam’s […]

In the past two weeks I’ve sent many emails to YouTubers about Human Extinction Simulator. I’m still far from done and it’s worth mentioning that for now I mostly focused on YouTubers with a small audience. Why not go straight to the “big ones”? Simply that’s what everyone else is doing. While doing this I […]

Well for some I’m guessing it’s a walk in the park but for me it’s terrifying. Exciting sure but still terrifying. When the best you have done so far is making a bit over $1k with a match-3 game you are filled with doubts even for a project you highly believe in. This week was my […]

You can have all the bell and whistles you want, for a strategy game if the AI doesn’t provide a challenge then it’s no good … well, I’m guessing at least … Coding the AI for Human Extinction Simulator was a challenge as it has nothing in common with what I’ve done previously. There’s no […]